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Red-hot Suarez on target for Reds

Chris Bascombe

ANFIELD is in the grip of a dependency culture, the range of Luis Suarez's influence on Liverpool making both impressive and worrying reading for manager Brendan Rodgers.

Of the 11 points Liverpool has accumulated in the English Premier League, nine have come as a result of Suarez's goals and assists. Without him, Liverpool would have been in the bottom three.

Managers will always dismiss the notion of a one-man team, but Suarez has often resembled a lone gunman leading the charge of an otherwise unarmed cavalry.

Rival managers believe stopping Suarez stops Liverpool, and the statistics seem to confirm this. Even Rodgers admits Suarez has spent ''a lot of time this season playing the back four on his own''.

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''People are looking at Liverpool and thinking if they can control Suarez they might cut our threat. But they are still unable to do it. For defenders he is a nightmare. He never gives them a breather, always making them think. Our job is to try to get a few players in to help the team and make us a threat in other areas.''

The Liverpool manager recognises the short and long-term importance of easing the load on his striker when he gets the chance in January. But there is also a timely reminder of the consequences of failing to satisfy the needs of iconic players in opponent Chelsea's ranks at Stamford Bridge on Monday. Like Suarez, Fernando Torres was once Liverpool's hero, pledging his loyalty on an annual basis while privately determining his ambitions could never be fulfilled on Merseyside.

Liverpool's fear is Suarez will also eventually tire of the same perpetual promises that the club will thrive again before being lured away, not by financial motivation, as was unfairly suggested about Torres, but by the desire to win titles.

Suarez signed a new contract last year when his club was able to fend off Paris St-Germain and Juventus, but if Barcelona or Real Madrid makes the call next time, Rodgers knows Liverpool has to be in a far healthier position.

Liverpool has won its last three trips to Stamford Bridge. It will need more than Suarez to make it four in a row, but if it succeeds, it is almost certain Merseyside's lone gunman will have either fired or loaded the bullets again.